Credit and debit cards are used pretty much all the time. We use them for everything from buying groceries, clothes, take-out food and gas to even paying household bills. Online shopping has also grown over the years, where people come home from work, grab a bite to eat, fire up the computer and shop away only to pull out the plastic and consummate the purchase.

But such usage carries risks. A few years ago my father received a call from his credit card company that someone was trying to use his credit card number online to purchase a $3,000 TV. They called him because it was not a normal spending habit, which threw up a red flag for his credit card company. He found out that an employee at a restaurant they frequented had stolen his credit card number, expiration date and security code from the back of the card. Score one for the wherewithal of the credit card issuer in alerting my father. However, many other cardholders are not so lucky.